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Acer Aspire 5739G review

Acer Aspire 5739G
Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £672
inc VAT

An expensive, but otherwise good all-round laptop. The 5739G has great build quality, a funky design and even a decent set of speakers.

Acer’s 5739G uses the full width of its case for the keyboard and numeric keypad. The numberpad is large and ideal for use with Excel, while the keyboard has a standard layout, although it seems a bit cramped on the left side. The keys’ action is light and but feedback is a bit weak. The touchpad is moulded into the case, with a stiff, see-saw button set away from the edge of the case.

The Aspire has the same distinctive design as Acer’s previous laptops, with a glossy lid, textured wrist-rest and a touch-sensitive control strip across the top of the keyboard. It’s not quite as busy as some models we’ve seen and it’s well built, although the lid isn’t as rigid as we’d like. The 15.6in screen with its 1,366×768 resolution has warm colours and even backlighting, but bear in mind that it has a reflective, glossy finish.

An Nvidia GT 240M graphics card powered the 5739G to a playable 29.2fps in our Call of Duty 4 benchmark. It won’t be able to handle the very latest 3D action games, but you should be able to play most games even if you have to lower quality settings. It’s more than capable of playing HD video, and HDMI and S/PDIF outputs give you flexibility if you want to connect to a larger screen or an AV system.

You may not want to though, as the built-in speakers are quite beefy, with more bass than we’ve come to expect from laptops. With Dolby Home Theater support, you get virtual surround sound, but it’s a bit boomy and the surround effects are off-centre. It’s loud enough to fill a small living room, however, and makes the 5739G one of the few laptops that could make do for the odd movie night.

With average performance in our benchmarks, the Aspire is suitable for general use, but might struggle with more demanding video or image editing applications. It has a decent set of expansion ports; the only things you might miss are an ExpressCard slot and Bluetooth. Overall it’s a well-rounded laptop, but there are better alternatives out there including Samsung’s R620 and the Sony Vaio VPC-EB1S0E.

Basic Specifications

Rating*****
ProcessorIntel Core 2 Duo P7450
Processor clock speed2.13GHz
Memory4.00GB
Memory slots2
Memory slots free0
Maximum memory8GB
Size39x372x262mm
Weight2.8kg
SoundRealtek High Definition Audio
Pointing devicetouchpad
Power consumption standby1W
Power consumption idle18W
Power consumption active40W

Display

Viewable size15.6 in
Native resolution1,366×768
Graphics ProcessorNvidia GeForce GT 240M
Graphics/video portsVGA, HDMI
Graphics Memory1,024MB

Storage

Total storage capacity500GB
Optical drive modelOptiarc AD-7585H
Optical drive typeDVD+/-RW +/-DL

Ports and Expansion

USB ports4
Bluetoothno
Wired network ports1x 10/100/1000
Wireless networking support802.11a/n
PC Card slotsnone
ModemYes
Supported memory cardsSD, MMC, Memory Stick Pro, xD
Other portseSATA (shared with USB socket), minijack audio output/S/PDIF (shared), minijack audio input, minijack microphone input

Miscellaneous

Carrying caseNo
Operating systemWindows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Operating system restore optionbackup and recovery software
Software includedNTI Media Maker, Microsoft Works 9

Buying Information

Warrantyone year RTB
Price£672
Detailswww.acer.co.uk
Supplierhttp://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk

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